The length of the MLS preseason rivals Major League Baseball's, so there will be ample time for development before Philadelphia opens its season March 25 in Seattle against Sounders FC.

The first workout in Greensboro will be tomorrow. The team conducted conditioning workouts last week at the Healthplex Sports Club in Springfield, Delaware County.

"Team bonding is a top priority as we go into our first camp," coach Peter Nowak said. "Second, we want to start to see what we have, what kind of system we can create and which direction we will go to create the system we will play this season."

Nowak made clear that the preseason will not be easy for his players.

"If you want to be successful in this league, you have to be prepared to fight," he said.

That means many players fighting for jobs.

Nowak, who won MLS championships as a player in Chicago and as a head coach of DC United, is not about to make predictions, but from his competitive nature, he says he does not expect to take the typical expansion-team attitude.

"There is a lot of potential and on paper everything looks good," he said. "But you have to be prepared to sacrifice and survive and meet our expectations as a coaching staff."

Nowak knows the league inside out but now his task will be getting to know his own team.

"We have to find our identity and find our way of playing soccer," he said. "Right now, it's like having a blank canvas, and it's up to us to be a Picasso or something we don't understand."

He's hoping for the Picasso version.

"It's important to have an idea and a vision on how to operate," he said.

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If you can keep your head when all about youAre losing theirs and blaming it on you,If you can trust yourself when all men doubt youBut make allowance for their doubting too,If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,Or being hated, don't give way to hating,And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:If you can dream--and not make dreams your master,If you can think--and not make thoughts your aim;If you can meet with Triumph and DisasterAnd treat those two impostors just the same;If you can bear to hear the truth you've spokenTwisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:If you can make one heap of all your winningsAnd risk it all on one turn of pitch-and-toss,And lose, and start again at your beginningsAnd never breath a word about your loss;If you can force your heart and nerve and sinewTo serve your turn long after they are gone,And so hold on when there is nothing in youExcept the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,Or walk with kings--nor lose the common touch,If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;If all men count with you, but none too much,If you can fill the unforgiving minuteWith sixty seconds' worth of distance run,Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,And--which is more--you'll be a Man, my son!